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DreadnoughtTonal Enhancement: Powerful top-end response

Andy says: The Dreadnought is the quintessential bluegrass guitar, and I wanted to bring a big, robust top-end response out of our 810. As a Dreadnought, it easily provides the low-end power I want, but where I’ve found some Dreadnoughts lacking over the years is that the low-end power comes at the expense of a weak upper register. If I’m playing in a bluegrass band and standing next to a mandolin player and a banjo player, I don’t want my turn for a solo to come and have everybody in the band go, “Shhh…it’s the guitar solo.” It makes you feel like a disappointment. So we worked to create a more vibrant kind of Dreadnought.
The challenge is that the body’s wider waist typically doesn’t give quite the tonal separation needed to generate a powerful upper register. To me, our Dreadnought design is a really beautiful modern interpretation of a traditional steel-string guitar. [Taylor designer] Larry Breedlove drew the most recent version of it a couple of years ago and did a great job. It has a refined look to it; it’s not a big, boxy, heavy-looking thing. This guitar looks like wearing a tuxedo with cowboy boots. It’s dressed up, but is ready to hop on a horse and ride away from the ball.
Between the new bracing and other tonal enhancements, we were able to articulate that treble punch. This Dreadnought will yield plenty of low end and midrange, but the distinctive twist for this instrument is turbo-charged power.